Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900)

Friedrich
Wilhelm Nietzsche was born on October 15, 1844 in Saxony,
which was then a province of the kingdom of Prussia. He was a
descendent of a long line of tradesmen, but his father and grandfather
were both Lutheran ministers.

Although Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy is brilliant,
insightful and relevant, he has been one of the most misquoted,
controversial and systematically misunderstood philosophers of the
nineteenth century. His philosophy has been misrepresented and
erroneously thought to have supported Nazism.

At the age of nineteen Nietzsche went to the University of
Bonn to study theology and classical philology with the aim of becoming
a pastor. This intention did not last, and in rebellion, he decided to
switch to Leipzig University, drop theology, and pursue other
interests.

One of those unintentional and inadvertent interests was
visiting a brothel whereupon he contracted a venereal disease, probably
syphilis. This began as one of two life-altering events for him, the
other one being his discovery of a copy of
Schopenhauer's The World as Will and
Representation in a secondhand bookstore. Of his find he
wrote:

"I found myself looking into
a
mirror which reflected the world, life and my own nature with
terrifying grandeur.....Here I saw sickness and health, exile and
refuge, Hell and Heaven."

At a time when Nietzsche found himself with nothing to believe
in, he
identified with Shopenhauer's pessimism and detachment. He was also
fascinated by Schopenhauer's concept of will and the significant role
it played in our view of the world. This laid the groundwork for his
work Will to Power.

After a brief stint in the military, cut short by injury,
Nietzsche was
offered the post of professor of philology at the University of Basel
in Switzerland. He was only twenty-four years old, but his mastery of
classical literature had opened the door for him, even though he not
yet taken his doctorate. After a short ten years he was forced to
retire from the post due to continuing poor health. He then traveled
across Europe, devoting himself to writing and his
recuperation.

Nietzsche's writings are varied and cover diverse topics from
ethics and religion to metaphysics and epistemology. He challenged the
foundations of Christianity and traditional morality and believed in
the realities of the world we live in, rather than in any world beyond.
He saw the individual's need to dominate and control the external
forces operating upon him, as his fundamental driving force. For
Nietzsche, the individual needed to possess the power to be the master
of his own fate (existentialism). He rejected in Christianity, what he
saw as a 'slave morality'.

Nietzsche's
concept of the Ubermensch, or Superman,
dominated much of his work. His conception of such a person (male or
female) was not one of superiority in breeding or endowment, but as one
who is able to confront all the possible difficulties and terrors of
life and still embrace it. In the same regard, he advocated rigorous
self-discipline and voluntary exposure to suffering in order to
exercise the 'will to power.' This 'will to power' could serve to
overcome the passive mediocrity he saw characterized in most people's
lives.

For Nietzsche, the 'will to power' is the essence of human
existence and the source of all of our strivings. It is also not only a
defense against the pain and bitterness of life for the purposes of
preserving oneself, but a means of mastering all adversity and claiming
a higher level of existence for oneself. In Nietzsche's universe 'God
is dead' and there is no level of accomplishment that we, as humans,
cannot set out to achieve. Nietzsche, likewise advises us to follow our
highest ideals and act on them each and every moment, since what we do
now, will recur throughout all eternity.

Contrary to popular misunderstanding, Nietzsche did not endorse a
master morality, instead he advocated that the strong had a duty
towards helping the less fortunate:

"The man of virtue, too,
helps the
unfortunate, but not, or almost not, out of pity, but prompted by an
urge which is begotten by the excess of power."

Nietzsche's philosophy was one of freedom and
life-affirmation. While
some of his writings are mistakenly regarded as lessons in nihilism
(the view that values have no justification or meaning), what Nietzsche
actually put forth was that we are in a spiritual crisis. He felt that
a new sustainable approach was needed for how we find truth and value;
otherwise we would indeed plummet into the horrors of nihilism, or
worse. Nietzsche called for a return to the moral concepts held by the
Ancient Greeks. Morality for him, and some of the Greeks, is dependent
upon human nature and the expression of what is excellent in us. His
concept of Ubermensch or Superman
resembles that of Aristotle's man of virtue.

As one of the first existentialist philosophers, Nietzsche
took philosophy in a totally different direction, yet his profound
influence extended far beyond the field of philosophy. The list of
figures upon whom he had an immense effect includes Yeats,
Strindberg, O'Neill, Shaw, Rilke, Freud, as well as many others.
Nietzsche's philosophy was one of style, clarity and
exhilaration.